Academic literature on the topic 'Modalite (grammaire)'

The study of phonological structure and patterns across languages is seen by contemporary phonologists as a way of gaining insight into language as a cognitive system. Traditionally, phonologists have focused on spoken languages. More recently, we have observed a growing interest in the grammatical system underlying signed languages of the deaf. This development in the field of phonology provides a natural laboratory for investigating language universals. As grammatical systems, in part, reflect the modality in which they are expressed, the comparison of spoken and signed languages permits us to separate those aspects of grammar which are modality-dependent from those which are shared by all human languages. On the other hand, modality-dependent characteristics must also be accounted for by a comprehensive theory of language. Comparing languages in two modalities is therefore of theoretical importance for both reasons: establishing modality-independent linguistic universals, and accounting for modality-dependent structure and organisation.

The article examines the place of Charles Ballyʼs paper «Syntaxe de la modalité explicite» in the body of work of the prominent Swiss linguist on the category of modality and identifies the role of his ideas in modern description of syntax. In Charles Ballyʼs linguistic heritage the concept of modality plays an exceptionally important role. His views o n the modal organization of the sentence are based on the theoretical perspective to describing the phenomenon of language proposed by his teacher Ferdinand de Saussure. Charles Ballyʼs theory of modality is an integral part of his general theory of enunciation. Identification of the two components in the semantic structure of the sentence, namely the modus and the dictum, becomes some kind of a bridge between Saussureʼs intellectualized grammar of language and the grammar of speech, which specifically entails the study of emotional and affective factors, and also stylistic aspects of human language. According to Charles Bally, the modus is a combination of a modal verb, which may contain a variety of shades of opinion, feeling or will, and a modal subject, which can represent a speaking subject and also other subjects. Charles Ballyʼs studies significantly influenced the interpretation of the category of modality in modern linguistics. However, not every theory based on the idea of identifying the modus and the dictum in the sentence can be theoretically convincing. Identifying the dictum with the representation of the objective, and the modus with the subjective led to unsubstantiated theoretical opposition of objective and subjective modality. Only misunderstanding of Charles Ballyʼs ideas might explain the attempts to attribute the ability to express the category of evaluation and emotionality to the modus. Charles Ballyʼs original theoretical views proved to be productive in the development of the cognitive theory of modality, which in its turn is based on other theoretical views on the phenomenon of language. Within this theory, modality is defined as a category that describes the mental-sensory differentiation of the speakerʼs thoughts in the process of sentence formation. According to the active approach to sentence interpretation, the subject of the modus in cognitive modality theory is only the speaker. The paper «Syntaxe de la modalité explicite», which Charles Bally described as a program of studies, has not lost its relevance. The task of describing the semantic shades of modality, as well as various forms of its expression, the principles of classification of modal verbs outlined in the paper as the goal of linguistics, remains largely unresolved today.